Karim Khan Zand rules Iran from Shiraz
The ruler who refused the title of shah
In the turmoil after Nader Shah's murder, Karim Khan, chief of the Zand tribe, brought almost all of Iran under his rule by the 1760s. He governed from Shiraz not as shah but as vakil, 'deputy of the people', and his reign is remembered as a calm interlude between the wars of Nader and the Qajars.
Wikipedia (English) · 18th century
Meanwhile around the world (±25 years)
Europe
- 1740–1748 War of the Austrian Succession — 11 years earlier
- 1755 Lisbon earthquake — 4 years later
- 1756–1763 Seven Years' War — 5 years later
- c. 1760 Start of the Industrial Revolution — 9 years later
- 1769 Watt's steam engine — 18 years later
Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1762 Accession of Catherine the Great — 11 years later
- 1764 Founding of the Hermitage — 13 years later
- c. 1768 Extinction of Steller's sea cow — 17 years later
- 1772–1795 Partitions of Poland — 21 years later
- 1774 Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca — 23 years later
Asia
- 1755–1758 The Dzungar genocide — 4 years later
- 1757 Battle of Plassey — 6 years later
- 1761 Third Battle of Panipat — 10 years later
Americas
- 1776 US Declaration of Independence — 25 years later
Oceania
- 1768–1771 Cook's first voyage — 17 years later
Alive at the time
- Voltaire (aged 57)
- Benjamin Franklin (aged 45)
- Mikhail Lomonosov (aged 40)
- James Cook (aged 23)
- Catherine the Great (aged 22)
- George Washington (aged 19)
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (aged 2)
- Tokugawa Yoshimune (aged 67)
- Carl Linnaeus (aged 44)
- Leonhard Euler (aged 44)